I watched the sun rise behind Vancouver’s skyline as student volunteers in wet suits and Hawaiian shirts pulled voyageur canoes into the icy morning water. Some had been at the Jericho Sailing Centre since 3 a.m., and by the time I arrived at 6:30, the shores were smattered with volunteers wearing the iconic Intramurals jackets. There were still two hours left until the first participants would arrive for the Day of the LongBoat.
The Day of the LongBoat is a UBC tradition organized by UBC Recreation’s Intramurals program. Canoe teams of eight to ten students race around a set of buoys to retrieve a baton and return it to the beach. The race ends when a member of the team bangs a gong with their retrieved baton. In total, students spend around an hour at the event; they check in, race, take some photos, enjoy the music and leave. However, for the volunteers, the Day of the LongBoat requires months of work and planning to bring the tradition to life.
Walking around the setup on the beach, I met one of the event’s student directors, Caroll Gao. Gao said she led a team of six assistant directors along with her co-director, Gabriella Guerra who had her own team of six. When I asked for an interview, she radioed Guerra. They weren’t sure how much time they would have once the event started, so we spoke right away.
Gao and Guerra said they had been planning the event since the middle of the summer. They estimated that throughout the process they had spent around 85 volunteer hours. Guerra explained the feeling of waking up at 2 a.m. for the day she had been working towards for over a month. “You wake up with a lot of excitement, a little bit of nerves,” she said.
Guerra got involved with Intramurals in 2020 when school was online. “I guess after COVID[-19] I sort of recognized the need in the student body to have events like this that brought back school spirit and just having fun with your friends.”
Gao said volunteering for UBC Rec Intramurals is a rare experience because of the scale of events the mostly-volunteer team is able to pull off. The Day of the LongBoat is the world's largest voyageur canoe race. “It's kind of unique to get to experience that while you're still in like your undergrad or your grad.”
Among the many student volunteers were also several alumni. As the first teams of participants startly slowly checking in at the event, I had the chance to speak with one of the event’s MCs through the loud 8 a.m. tunes.
On the balcony of the Sailing Centre, overlooking the start beach stood a very energetic UBC alum with a microphone in her hand and a smile on her face. She told me, “the energy comes from the sun, from the awesome weather and it comes from people and students like you.”
The first team of the day walked in with matching costumes. “We need our tutus and tiaras to help us seize the day,” said the group of first-years competing in their first ever Day of the LongBoat.
Twenty minutes later, the canoes were off. As team after team completed the race and banged the gong, I saw volunteers working from the registration tents all the way to the finish line and every single one looked genuinely happy to be there.
At around 9 a.m., I planned to get an interview with the event’s overseeing director and UBC Rec full-time Intramural Event Coordinator Alex Northey. I found Northey on the beach and took a few steps away from the commotion to have a quick chat. As soon as I asked my first question, Northey had to leave to assist a team that had unceremoniously capsized.
Five minutes later, the boat had been turned upright and Northey was back to continue the interview. He told me that the event was running with a staff of 100 people, most of whom were student volunteers.
“They see that they want to be a part of something and that they really get ownership over something. They get to own an area and they get to execute on it,” he said.
In the months leading up to the event, UBC Rec’s usual canoe rental company lost all their equipment in a tragic fire. “We had to go on a search far and wide, that went from Fort Langley to Kamloops to Whistler, and search for Voyageur canoes.”
Voyageur canoes are a specific large type of canoe that are rare to find. When the team was able to pull together 11 canoes to make this Day of the LongBoat happen, it made this year’s event even more special.
Throughout the day there was paddling, dancing, laughter and the occasional capsize. Quietly uniting this whole event were the 100 enthusiastic volunteers without whom none of this would be possible.
“When you're wearing the [Intramural] jacket around campus, you can see people feel comfortable to come and talk to you and you can help them out in any which way,” said Assistant Director of Staffing and fourth-year student Sammy Wilhelm. “We say it's the power of the jacket.”
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